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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMIN GREDC 2017/09/06 (2016-2018)Committee on Governmental Relations and Economic Development 9th Session Hawaii County Building 25 Aupuni Street Hilo, Hawaii September 6, 2017 CALL TO The regular meeting of the Committee on Governmental Relations and Economic ORDER: Development was called to order at 9:01 a.m., in the Council Chambers, Hilo, by Dru Mamo Kanuha, Chair. ROLL CALL: Present: Mr. Dru Mamo Kanuha, Chair Ms. Jennifer Ruggles, Vice Chair Ms. Maile Medeiros David, Member Ms. Karen Eoff, Member Ms. Susan L. K. Lee Loy, Member Ms. Eileen O'Hara, Member Ms. Valerie Poindexter, Member Mr. Herbert M. Richards, III, Member (came in later) Absent & Excused: Mr. Aaron S. Y. Chung, Member STATEMENTS The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, FROM THE Statements from the Public on Agenda Items. PUBLIC ON AGENDA ITEMS: The following individual registered to speak and came forward when called by the Chair: Dwight Vicente: Comm. 16.1, comment. CHR KANUHA: Mahalo for your testimony. Anybody else wishing to testify in this committee or on this item, please let me know. Okay, with that, we'll end public testimony and move on with the agenda. Mr. Clerk, if you could read in Communication 16.1. COMMUNI- The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, CATIONS: Communications. GREDC-9 September 6, 2017 Comm. 16.1: REPORT OF SISTER CITY ACTIVITIES: DECEMBER 5, 2016, TO JUNE 30, 2017 From Executive Assistant and Sister City Protocol Officer, Rose Bautista, dated July 31, 2017, submitting the above report pursuant to Section 2-166, Hawaii County Code. Motion to Close File: Ms. Poindexter moved to close file on Comm. 16.1. Seconded by Ms. David. CHR KANUHA: Committee Members, discussion? We don't have Rose Bautista here today, but we do have Managing Director Okabe if there are any questions that the committee would like to ask or get clarification on. Mr. Okabe, if you'd just like to introduce yourself and maybe give a brief summary of the activities between—since Mayor Kim took office, I guess. MR. OKABE: Wil Okabe, managing director. Since we took over, there has been a lot of activity within our sister cities. Many of the sister cities that have been coming from Japan, the County has had an opportunity to host them and also entertain them, and go over some of their sister relationships within lot of the people who have been coming every year. We've had some of the sister cities that we've had no communication with for a while, so that, we have to revisit to see if we're going to continue being sister cities with them, like I think Chile is one of them. And some of them are actually not active in regards to—with this relationship. But I've had the opportunity to go with the Chair to Japan about three weeks ago, to Ikaho, in Shibukawa, so that was definitely an experience. We represented the County very well. I'm sure Chair Poindexter can also attest that we were hosted very well by the Japanese government and also by the community. And as you well know, Councilman Chung went there eight or nine times, so he can understand the protocol and the way that our County members were treated. CHR KANUHA: Mr. Chung. MR. CHUNG: Most of which weren't on the County's dime, I just wanted to make that very clear. I did most of that travelling when I was not in office but after I'd left. But thanks for bringing that up. CHR KANUHA: Council Members, any other discussion? Mr. Richards. MR. RICHARDS: Thank you, Chair. Thank you for coming in this morning. The sister city relationship, one of the things we've talked about is next spring, the Cherry Blossom Festival in Waimea. It's going to be a commemorative year, and the concept was to invite our sister cities from Japan to come attend. I'm Page 2 GREDC-9 September 6, 2017 thinking this may be a time we could use to rekindle some of those relationships that have gone quiet. What's your opinion on that one? MR. OKABE: I think that might be a possibility, but I think lot of the sister cities, when we're looking at the way they're scheduling it, lot of it is during the summer. I think in October there's one, but they have it all spread out. So they have exchange students coming in to home -and -home type of situations, too. As far as theI really don't know if an invitation on thatI know you're talking about the 125th Anniversary of this thing? Or what? MR. RICHARDS: No, the one in Waimea, the Cherry Blossom MR. OKABE: Just the Cherry Blossom Festival? MR. RICHARDS: I think it's the 20th or 25th year and so thinking if we invited our sister cities, it may be a good time. And really, we start the planning now so giving plenty of lead time to come to that thing. So anyway, I thought it was appropriate to bring it up at this time. Thank you. MR. OKABE: Okay, so you're talking about all of the sister cities from the Philippines to MR. RICHARDS: From Japan. MR. OKABE: Only Japan? MR. RICHARDS: Yeah, I was thinking Japan. Originally, the Cherry Blossom trees there I guess trace back originally to Japan, 50 years ago, that something was brought. And so it just may be a time to kind of again, bring partnerships together and goodwill ambassador. MR. OKABE: Okay, we'll look into that. CHR KANUHA: Thank you. Mr. Chung. MR. CHUNG: Thank you. Since Fresh isn't here, I've now become the resident sister city expert, but with regard to Mr. Richards' suggestion, he had broached that with me several months ago. Great idea, but the only thing you guys have to watch out for though when you extend these types of invitations, is that it's not construed to be something where we're going to be picking up the tab for their travel. Because normally when you do extend an invitation, that implies that you're paying for their travel, their stay, and all of these things. So, it all comes down to how you structure the invitation, I would think. Page 3 GREDC-9 September 6, 2017 And then another thing when I looked over all of our list of sister cities, and you know, we recently established another one, which is very worthy and I think it's going to be good for the County in the long run. But I think we should start thinking about stopping establishing anymore, because they are costly endeavors. We have a responsibility to these sister cities when we do establish the relationship to go and either visit them occasionally and do things like that, and it'swe got like about eight of them on the low I think, right? And that's rough. I don't think even City and County of Honolulu has anything approaching that number. So, we might want to think about just stopping it and maybe even, I hate to say it, but even paring that amount down at some point, for those that we haven't really done anything with over the last several years. Just my thoughts. Thank you. CHR KANUHA: Thank you. MR. OKABE: I'd just like to add that we're really lucky on the Big Island to have host organizations like the Japanese Chamber, the Japanese Community Association, and those host organizations that actually really do all of the actual hosting. They're the ones that organize the dinners and they take them golfing on their dime and they take them around the island. So it's not really the County doing that. So, if anything is going to happen for this sister city invitation, we would check with the host organization of what they think about because they're going to be the ones with them all day. Whereas, when we went to Japan, the government and the business organizations definitely was taking us all around the place. But the County will not be able to do that. But we welcome all the Council people here to do that if you want. MR. CHUNG: But, if I may. See, the thing about that is, and I think both Sue and I would recognize the importance of all of these organizations in organizing and extending their resources whenever these sister city people come. But, no matter what, it's the County's sister city and you know, if it were that organization's sister city, that's one thing, but the County is somehow going to get sucked in. Now we got some really good sister city relationships, I grant you. The Ikaho one, I mean they come here like three times a year. They contribute more to our economy than we'll ever do in the lifetime of our relationship to them, one year. But at that the same time, it is our relationship. Chile, I don't even know who the sponsoring group is. France, it's all good places to go, I wouldn't mind travelling there, but I don't know what's going on with any of those. MR. OKABE: So we're going to revisit that agreement or you know MR. CHUNG: Right. Thank you. Page 4 GREDC-9 September 6, 2017 CHR KANUHA: Ms. Lee Loy. MS. LEE LOY: Thank you, Chair. Mr. Okabe, I know you just travelled to Ikaho and I recognize it's a sister city, but would you mind expanding on why Ikaho is a sister city and why it—you and the Chair travelled there? MR. OKABE: I think that the reason is because they invited us to Ikaho. There is a relationship between the Merrie Monarch—the winner of the Merrie Monarch goes there to Ikaho to do a hula festival, so it is a very big activity in Ikaho. And it's more of a cultural thing of how the Japanese people has really embraced the culture of Hawaii, and that is one of the biggest advantages of that particular sister city relationship. MS. LEE LOY: Thank you, Chair. And like Mr. Chung mentioned, these relationships are really important and they contribute a lot. But this one particular sister city is a mirror reflection of what we do here at the Merrie Monarch Festivals, and I'm just going to express again, how disappointed I am on the business decision that was made with the Merrie Monarch Festivals. You know, if we're going to maintain this relationship, we need to do everything we can to support that festival because not only of what it does for us here at home, but the international exposure that festival gets. So thank you, and thank you for sharing that, Mr. Okabe, because I know they are amazing hosts, and they have created a festival there that mirrors ours, and it really was that feeling of connection and culture that really created this relationship. So I just want us to be mindful of what relationships we keep and what relationships we have to begin to let go by the wayside. Thank you. CHR KANUHA: Ms. O'Hara. MS. O'HARA: Thank you, Chair. I'm just in response to something that Mr. Chung just brought up about some of the relationships not being very active in the recent years, and one of those is our relationship with La Serena in Chile. And we do understand that it was initiated through our astronomy industry and in particular, Gemini Telescopes, which has a telescope in that area, Gemini South it's known as, and we have Gemini North. And I have been in touch with the folks at Gemini who founded that sister city relationship. Some of them are no longer active employees but I did get some history on that and I would for one, like to initiate some activity in that relationship. I think it would be a real positive for Hilo. So if we're thinking of calling some of the sister cities that haven't' been active, I would like to first advocate for seeing if we can reactivate that relationship, okay? Thank you. CHR KANUHA: Thank you, Ms. O'Hara, anybody else? Okay. Mahalo, Page 5 GREDC-9 September 6, 2017 Mr. Okabe for being here this morning. I just really, for myself, always emphasized that these relationships with our sister cities are really important to who we are as a County, and I know the Mayor feels the same way. So, please emphasize to him that we really feel that these are important parts of who we are, and how we build these relationships to move forward, and to gain knowledge of where different cities from around the world are coming from and how we can build upon them. So, please emphasize that on our behalf, and thank you for being here. Vote on Comm. 16.1: The motion to close file on Comm. 16.1 was carried by Filed the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Chung, David, Eoff, Lee Loy, O'Hara, Poindexter, Richards, Ruggles, and Chair Kanuha — 9. Noes: None. Absent: None. Excused: None. CHR KANUHA: Motion passes. ORDER OF The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of RESOLUTIONS: business, Order of Resolutions. (There were none.) BILLS FOR The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of ORDINANCES: business, Bills for Ordinances. (There were none.) Page 6 GREDC-9 September 6, 2017 ADJOURN There being no further business, at 9:20 a.m., Ms. Poindexter moved to adjourn MENT: the meeting. Seconded by Ms. David and carried by the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Chung, David, Eoff, Lee Loy, O'Hara, Poindexter, Richards, Ruggles, and Chair Kanuha — 9. Noes: None. Absent: None. Excused: None. CHR. KANUHA: We are adjourned. Approved: Mr. Dru Mamo Kanuha, Chair Governmental Relations and Economic Development Committee DMK/jm (Date) Page 7